Transcript
Episode 1 — Let’s talk cults
Tim Conlin 0:10
Hello, and welcome to the FinancialDstress podcast.
Maria Miletic 0:16
a very exciting our very first podcast episode. We're so relevant.
Tim Conlin 0:21
Yes, we're we're just capturing the podcast theme just as it's about to die. Yeah, we're. So we're trying to be relevant.
Maria Miletic 0:30
Yeah. The slow steady demise of the podcast is when we decide to come in. Exactly. Yeah. So it's an interesting name, FinancialDstress. Why don't you walk me through how he came up with this name?
Tim Conlin 0:43
Alright, well, financial D-stress with a play on words. De-stress. Oh, I
Maria Miletic 0:48
didn't get that. Thank you so much.
Tim Conlin 0:50
The Dstress the whole ideas. I think both of us were fascinated with the idea of how people make decisions. And, you know, just the way our biochemistry and our psychology influences how we make decisions. And so rather than your typical financial media approach to financial news, you know, like, today, the s&p 500 went through its 300 day moving average. Yeah, so I think we want to be a little more human, because money is very part of who we are. It's very personal. Money is kind of like the evidence of your life's work. It carries with it so much emotion. And, you know, I think that's what we want to explore on this podcast. And why de stress? Well, I think, when we're in a position of stress, and when we're under stress, we we make bad decisions. So if we can kind of learn a little more about ourselves, and how we make decisions. I think that's a good thing.
Maria Miletic 1:55
Yeah, we don't want to go into financial distress, we want to go into financial de-stress. And we want to tell people that it doesn't have to be so complicated. And it doesn't have to be so scary with the right tools and tactics. And knowing how we think and what our own brain wiring and chemistry does, is really important to know then the choices that we're going to make and what we're going to do.
Tim Conlin 2:17
Yeah, so excited today. It's our first podcast when you're back, you're coming back from maternity leave. So you'll be back in a very abbreviated maternity leaves. Yes, really love your job.
Maria Miletic 2:27
I do. I really, really love. I, you know, he's okay. He has really long hair these days. And he's, he's looking pretty interesting. I'm going to describe what he looks like a bit later on. But right now, I just want to say that Yeah, I really like what I do. Otherwise, I wouldn't be coming back after four months of maternity leave. Right. And I know that for you. This is your life's work and your purpose. And your
Tim Conlin 2:50
Yeah, I mean, it sounds really corny. But honestly, I get up in the morning, and I'm just so excited to go to work. And now I don't go to work in my house. And my commute is is just to my, my basement. Yeah, but I really do enjoy what I do, and I never want to retire. And
Maria Miletic 3:10
and so you're a portfolio manager. Yeah. So you've obviously had your you've done your CFA How long ago? 20 years ago?
Tim Conlin 3:18
Yeah, I think I've been a CFA for over 20 years. I started out in finance in the accounting field. I got my CPA, and back in,
Maria Miletic 3:29
were probably born with a little Serbian immigrant girl.
Tim Conlin 3:33
Yes. And so it has been something that's evolved over time. And in terms of what I mean, back to kind of the theme of the podcast, what, where can you add value? You know, that's what we talk about all the time as a team that we're just here to add value, we want to add value. And, you know, I've learned maybe over time, and now you're 30 years in finance, over 25 years advising people on their, their money and their finances. You know, I find the value you bring to the table is as much the practice of investing and the strategies as it is understanding human nature, my own and my clients. And that's, again, back to why we're why we're here today we're talking about financial de-stress.
Maria Miletic 4:24
Exactly. And I think, yeah, for both of us, too. It's the client side of it, the personal side of it. That's what's most interesting about what we do. And what really gets us excited every day is the connections that we can actually form with people and that we have. So I've been doing this not as long as you I've been doing this just under 10 years, but now I'm an associate investment advisor thanks to you being on your team. So we work closely together. And I think that that's one thing that that, you know, I think a lot of millennials kind of maybe might want to jump from job to job and not really sure where their niches and what they want to do, but I've been really lucky from the get go being in this industry to know that this is what I want to do forever, you know, I have no, no thought in my head that maybe I might want to try something else. It was from day one that this is this is what I know. And this is what I love.
Tim Conlin 5:12
I know how rare that is, right? Because it's most people aren't. I don't know, the statistics. But I imagine most people don't like what they do. Yeah. And they do it for just for financial reasons, or just to pay the bills. But yeah, I realize how fortunate we both are to be in something we'd love to do.
Maria Miletic 5:29
Yeah. And so I think that that explains to why we wanted to start this podcast as well, as you know, we have clients that, that are going to be listening to this and hopefully share with their friends and family. But we, you know, even if no one listens to it, we always say that we want this to be a creative outlet, because we have so many conversations just among ourselves that, you know, maybe they might not be interesting to anybody else. Hopefully they are. But that's a big part of the reason why we wanted to do this podcast, especially for you, your mind works in a million different directions all the time. And so this will be a nice creative outlet for you to share some of your brilliant ideas. Oh, wow. Yeah, and not so brilliant ideas. We always say that we want to be like the ladies of the view, you know, the popular talk with the four ladies that just, you know, yell at each other basically, and other people, but we want to be like the ladies of the view, but be less annoying. Okay. And also because of your uncanny resemblance to Whoopi Goldberg. Yes, it's nice, you know, transition and what we want to do. But, you know, speaking really, because podcasts, we can't actually see what we look like. So I want to describe what you look like a little bit. And I think, you know, four years ago, when we first met, you look like a normal guy with a normal haircut and a suit. And then, you know, just the transition over the last four years to where we are now is a very interesting one. So if you think actually what you look like is Jeff Bridges.
Tim Conlin 7:03
Oh, yeah. Jeff Bridges is about 20 years old me by Thank you like
Maria Miletic 7:08
to do well? Well, you have long shaggy hair that's currently in a man bun. You have a beard that looks actually a bit more tame than it did last time. But it's a beard guy now. Yeah. And you have aviator style. Computer glasses. Similar to Joe Biden. Yeah. Joe Biden. Yeah, yes, yes, your hero. And so some might say that you look a little bit like a cult leader. Oh, yeah. a cult leader. Yeah. What do you think about you know, if someone said that, hey, you look like a cult leader.
Tim Conlin 7:40
I don't know. You don't listen, I grew up in the 70s. Born in the late 60s, grew up in the 70s. And through the 80s. And then cults were scary. Like, while they're still scarred, they're still scary. But then it was, there was a big deal because in the late 60s, it was Charles Manson, the Manson family. And then in the in the late 70s, and it was about 11. And I remember this when Jim Jones Jonestown Massacre happened. 900 people
Maria Miletic 8:11
died. And now you have him on your shirt. I've got a shirt.
Tim Conlin 8:15
It's the Brian Jonestown Massacre, which is a band named after this. It's kind of a little sick. But yeah. Anyway, um, yeah, it's it's sort of and then there was the one in the 90s the Heaven's Gate called the people that were the little tracks suits Nikes you might not remember that But anyway, it was scary, you know, and, but at the same time, I think you know, the way media and culture is sort of looked at cults there's there's some odd humor to it, too. I mean, I can't help but think like, if you think I look like a cult leader you know, I don't I don't want to run a cult. I'm not interested in you know, like crazy sick. Yeah, cult. But what it does appeal to me you know, what appeals to me most about being cult leader as someone to do my yard work. Oh, notice when they have like movies and stuff and they show a cult and and all the little cult people that follow the leader there they're out there doing yard Yeah. impeccable gardens. Great guard. Yeah. And so I'm thinking yeah, I start my own called Julie's never gonna bother me again about weeding the garden or dealing with the lawn shoveling I'll just get all my little followers. Oh, yard
Maria Miletic 9:30
works. Okay, so if you guys want to sign up to be a part of Tim's called, then you give us a call at 555.
Tim Conlin 9:37
Like, if you like gardening, yes. Yeah. So yeah, fantasy
Maria Miletic 9:40
resume. So yeah, we took a little detour there into the land of cults, but it is actually relevant for what we want to talk about today in this first episode.
Tim Conlin 9:51
Yeah, like I think when it comes to like, I think we could explore in finance one of the great cult leaders Who is who is Warren Buffett? Ah, and so I think he resembles a cult leader in a lot of ways he's charismatic. He's, he's saying something different than what everybody else is saying. And he had the courage to, to maybe speak differently about investing in finance. And one of the great evidences is that a word evidence is the evidence of his success as a cult leader, his notoriety, but also you think of the annual meeting of Berkshire Hathaway.
Maria Miletic 10:36
So they have about prior to COVID, about 30,000 people that would join, and they would listen to Warren and Charlie speak for five to six hours sometimes, right? And just ask them questions, and they would basically just share their ideas and their tactics. So it is, you know, not we're saying that it's like a cult, but in the sense that people really admire him and look up to him. and rightfully so he's obviously one of the richest men in the world. And he's very successful. But he's also very humble just when you listen to him talk. And I think that's what makes him so interesting. And why we wanted to talk a little bit about him today. And what, what we could learn from, from him, right?
Tim Conlin 11:19
Yeah. And let me I admire what he's done. He speaks with authority. He does something interesting is when, when asked a question, it's almost as though he, he offers an answer to the question that should have been asked not the question that was asked. And by that, I mean, when it comes to assessing an investment portfolio, he a lot of his writings, and in his annual report, which I really recommend you read, he talks about not being so heavily influenced by short term factors, such as week by the millisecond can see what our stock portfolios are doing, we can, we can see how they're performing from one day to the next. Yet, that's absurd. when you really think about it, we're trying to make decisions to enrich ourselves over many, many years. But yet, we're so influenced by media, and just by even, frankly, the financial, you know, halls of learning, you know, the professors of finance and the studies have been done, we're really taught almost to assess portfolios and investments based on very short term measures of risk, ie volatility. And what Warren Buffett harps on is buying great companies and assessing them through the lens of the value that they're creating the true value that they're creating over time. And that isn't necessarily measured by the stock price in the short run. Sometimes it's completely irrational, what happens to stock prices? So Warren Buffett changed the question that was being asked and answered it and said, How do we really assess how a company is building value, and he actually stresses book value, rather than market value. So the book value of the assets, the accretion in a company's value, great companies, he says, Get get more valuable every day. And that, he said, it's so much to me, it just sounds so, so true. But yet all around us, we have these influences that cause us to look at, you know, the short run. And so I do think he's changed the narrative. He's had enduring success as so many other cult leaders or gurus. And that's a whole other topic, we'll talk about financial gurus that are out there. But he's an exception. He's had exceptional results over many decades, practicing some of these, really what are tried and true. You know, approaches to to investing,
Maria Miletic 14:02
and he's proven his philosophy and his style over time, too, right? It's not just something that he is saying, but he truly believes in in what he does, and how he does it. And you can you can tell, right, he is he's buying into his own brand, if you will. So he is.
Tim Conlin 14:20
Yeah, and he's had a knack for finding, and he's not perfect. And, you know, I know all the media is, maybe more recently as Warren Buffett's aging is a tear, tear down maybe his track record and what he's done.
Maria Miletic 14:33
But you talked a little bit about how he's coached people to look more at book value than market value. And this is the thing that can be said about all of life is people's coaching style and what they they think that people should focus on. So what do you think about Warren Buffett and his coaching approach?
Tim Conlin 14:50
Yeah, I mean, coaches are so important, right? Even the top basketball player in the world, right, LeBron James has values coaches. I mean, outside of his coach of his team, he's reported to spend over a million dollars a year on coaches around his health and his diet and his exercise. And so I think even Warren Buffett surrounds himself with bright people. And and even he has a financial advisor, apparently, but a great coach. What does a great coach do is what Warren Buffett does, he frames his approach in, in positive terms, affirmative terms rather than negative. his buddy, Charlie Munger is a little bit more of a negative guy. But Warren Buffett, he's reported to say very often, he says, the best days are ahead of us, the best days of America are ahead of us. And this is hard to imagine, given that we've just gone through this crazy election season and, and some of the, the troubles that America is experiencing. But But really, he's an optimist. And in my mind, one of my favorite people is my friend, Rod sawatzky, who's a, who's a great coach, he's a coach of coaches, and he also coaches basketball, but he's very cautious to coach his kids in the affirmative, rather than the negative. So he'll he'll coach his kids towards what they should be doing, rather than what they should not be doing. And that's really important, you know, and that's what Warren Buffett talks a lot about building value, and how a great companies do that how to great companies maintain their market position. And, and really makes his decisions around companies that can have some enduring competitive advantage that will endure over time that won't be just short sighted, and take short sighted, you know, approaches to running their business business that build tremendous value over years look like look at Coca Cola, you know, it's it's sugar and water. And it's a formula, that's it's special. But you would think over time, that that would have eroded and competitors would come in. And you remember, there was the private label soda pop, you could get at the supermarket. And you know, it's not quite as good as Coke, but it's a lot cheaper. But yet Coca Cola continues to innovate. It's not like they're innovating the recipe, but they have innovative marketing, and built a tremendous brand. And so he applies this affirmative sort of positive orientation to making decisions rather than rather than negative. And I really try to practice that too, in my life is think, not, you know, not seeing the world through rose colored glasses. But but really the idea that even in the midst of great crisis and turmoil that you can still look forward to something positive and something optimist, and that's what you know, that's what I think he does so well.
Maria Miletic 17:56
Yeah. And he's, if anyone has the time to watch documentary about him called becoming Warren Buffett, it's really interesting. And it's goes into a glimpse into his life looks things it's on crave. It's on gravy. I haven't seen it on Netflix, maybe it is, but but it's really interesting. And it just goes through, yeah, you know, his his personal life, as well as how he, how he views markets and just in life in general. But, you know, it's really apparent that he enjoys what he does, and he loves going to work everyday. Otherwise, why would he be doing that? Well into his 80s. Right. And, and that's, that's one of the things that was so interesting about him. But also he focuses really heavily on being a lifelong learner, and reading a lot and never, and never stopping, right. For someone like him, it would be easy to say, well, I've seen everything I know everything. I can stop here. But no, he's constantly keeping his mind sharp and his brain active. And I think that's something that we can really learn from him. But you know, and I think it was a good discussion about him now. But if we can condense maybe three of the the main things that that you think, are the most important things that someone like Warren Buffett has taught us, what would they be?
Tim Conlin 19:07
Yeah, well, so many, but if I kind of limited to three things, I mean, first of all, just limit your consumption of short term information, charts and graphs and predicting the economy. Warren Buffett puts most of his brain cells into trying to identify great businesses and his his I think he's reported to say he spends about seven or eight minutes a year, thinking about the economy, most of the time, he's thinking about great businesses. So limit your consumption of short term information. And in the same vein, the second point would be in a in line with being a lifelong learner. Understand that you're going to get more wisdom and more value from books than you will from short term publications, especially today. It's not the newspaper anymore, it's internet website that are designed to to make you click and read an article but wisdom it's sort of an inverse relation. Share between the quantity of wisdom and the frequency of the publication. So by that, I mean, books are infrequently published. So that would be the highest level of wisdom, maybe periodicals, quarterly periodicals maybe would be next in line. And then the least wisdom of all would be daily publications, especially the internet. And in the financial press, I mean, there's a value there, but but not much, not much in terms of making good investment decisions. And by the way, this is a little bit of a rant, but you know, they're not, they're the business channels and the financial press, they're not there to help you make good decisions, it's very important to understand that they're there to sell advertising, I joke about this, they're there to sell you that reliable new curl. Yeah. And, and they do that by enticing you to click that article or watch that program. And, and, you know, after doing this long enough that I have the business channel on all day, it's very predictable. Whenever there's a bit of a crisis, there's a certain suite or list of guests that they bring on that pylon and make a bad situation worse, and they do it because their ratings go up. And they can sell more for the advertising. So really important to focus on books to gain long term wisdom. And then maybe the third thing, you know, take a, take a page from his playbook, and understand that the great companies get more valuable every day, regardless of what's happening with stock price. They're gonna build value over time. And, and, and, you know, sometimes great companies fail. And that's what causes us to maybe be concerned about putting all our eggs in one basket. That's one of the reasons we diversify, because even even Jeff Bezos at Amazon said, someday Amazon will go bankrupt. And our job is as employees of Amazon is to try to extend the life of Amazon as long as possible. So, you know, it's not just simply buy and hold with no conscience, but understand that you should really align yourself with companies that are innovating, and building value. And, and then be ruthless with the ones that aren't, you know, if it begins to, to look like you're in a company that is being disrupted by technology, for example, in the in the retail sector, it's pretty well known that Amazon is really, you know, later, looking on traditional retail companies like JC Penney and Macy's. You know, sometimes it's important to understand when, when the, you know, everything's conspired against you, it's time to make a change.
Maria Miletic 22:40
But I think so that third point, and most importantly, would be to focus on your book value and, and your long term visions as opposed to your market value. And what the news is saying that day that you should be worried about.
Tim Conlin 22:53
Yeah, exactly.
Maria Miletic 22:56
So in keeping with the Buffett theme, and in terms of the documentary, too, there was one really interesting part of it, where Bill Gates dad actually asked Bill Gates and Warren Buffett to both write down on a piece of paper, what they thought the most important pillar of success was, and without talking to each other, they both wrote down focus. And so Warren, you know, gotten to the terms of what he thinks, you know, focus does for him, and how he kind of does focus and zero in on certain things that he's thinking about and mulling over. But it got me to thinking about what, for myself, and for you, what are our most important pillars of success are? And when I was thinking about it, too, for me, I think it's it's role modeling is a really important one. Remember that? Well, I think, for me, especially to being being younger, as well, and and just seeing, you know, even the influence that my parents had on me when I was growing up and seeing their successes, as well as their failures, too, and how that kind of approached how I how I think about the world and how I go about things, but also their, their guidance, right has has been hugely influential for me. And also I look to people like you as well. And I think that's one of the main reasons that I really wanted to work with you too, is because you are a great role model for me and and, you know, your positivity and everything else that you kind of teach me how to do and be better at. But then it's interesting for me to hear your side on what you think the most important pillars of success are?
Tim Conlin 24:23
Well, definitely, I mean, just hearing focus, I wasn't really prepared to think about this. But focus is key, you got to kind of lock in and move forward. I mean, I think I have a you know, a good measure of focus in in how I approach my day. And but I would say probably what comes to mind is curiosity. And you mentioned lifelong learner, Warren Buffett to live longer. I mean, I love I'm just curious and I love to read. I love the idea of this analytical thinking like taking analogies from completely Different parts of life from different realms, and then applying that to investment business. So I think that's another thing. And then maybe Finally, I'm, you know, supposed to be just one thing. But the final thing would be optimism. You know, I think, the track record of humanity, you know, there's a lot of awful things that have happened. But ultimately, you know, we have good reason to be optimistic. We're seeing the pace of innovation, accelerating, and we're seeing all kinds of drivers of, of improvement in so many ways. And I know that sounds perhaps ridiculous to some, but I think there's there's a pretty strong evidence that supports being optimistic about the future. And, and, you know, what's the alternative? The alternative is not to be optimistic. And that's, that doesn't sound very fun to me. No. And if you're not pessimistic in the investment world, it probably doesn't matter what you do. If you think the world's going to hell in a handbasket, then really, there's probably not much, much you can do. But but i don't i don't believe that. I really don't. I believe there's good reason to be optimistic. I learned that probably from my parents and, and understanding that, no matter how tough things can get, sometimes it's, you know, there's, there's gonna be another day.
Maria Miletic 26:26
Yeah, well, and we're gonna, this is a conversation that we could have over and over again to write with different points. And we're gonna definitely in future episodes, talk a little bit more about this and some of the points that you just made. But I think that for now, too. It's it'll be important for people that are listening right now to think about what they view it to be the most important pillar of success because it is a really interesting. It is an interesting thing to think about if you haven't already. And yeah, so I'm curious to hear what other people think. But I think that with that this is a good discussion that we had today. So
Tim Conlin 26:59
we'll do this again. Let's Let's hope we meet again soon. Take care Maria.
Maria Miletic 27:04
Thank you.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai